A spot light on a steel folding chair.

Sounds of clinking bottles and running liquid from an unknown source.

Accompanied by the grumblings of a drunk.

Mark Flynn.

The warehouse.

He stumbles forward, a trail of alcohol forming behind him, cradling a bottle busted at the top.

He smiles into the camera a moment.

“Sorry. Had a rough night Saturday. Still recovering from it.”

Now, sitting in a steel folding chair.

Holding a bottle of Jameson’s in one hand.

The other hand in his pocket, his fingers twiddling an unseen object.

His eyes slowly drift to the camera. The hand in his jacket visibly tightens around this object, compressing it as his eyes close.

“Don’t worry, kids. I’ve got a little show planned for you. This week, I'll try to keep you little shits entertained."

“But before our feature presentation, I thought I’d give you a little pre-show for the big headliner you’re sticking around for.”

“The Gauntlet. The Big one.”

“And the blubbering freak who’s already licking it clean for me.”

Flynn leans back in his chair.

"Mystery. I'm going to use small words. I'm going to use these small words not so you understand me but because I want to enjoy this."

"I want to waste my ability with the English language, to forget how completely I could destroy you with a pure untempered thought."

"To make it clear just how fucked you are."

The bottle he slips between his legs.

"How... fucked... You are.""

He echoes as his now free hand unscrews the bottle. His shoulders twist as all his focus goes into freeing the contents of the glass...

The cork pops off.

Flynn breaths heavily as the bottle sits in his hands, in active for the moment.

"But, first. How are you, Mystery? Notice I've beaten back that nasty habit I used to have of calling you Sid Feder."

“Why?”

"Because Sid Feder died. Sid Feder shuffled off this mortal coil. Sid Feder is in Hell paying for his wife's infidelities."

Flynn leans in.

"Oh. For those of you too busy blowing the man that feeds to understand words beyond a third grade reading level like my two-man target audience here. I mean, Flo Feder. Taking two men, one from each end, playing a game of ‘Bedroom Bouncy Whorse’ so her mentally challenged bumbling oaf of a husband could keep a job wrestling.”

“I assume that’s why you’re suddenly 200 pounds fatter, Feder. That deep-seated shame that comes from your dead wife’s tendencies to bump uglies with uglies only slightly less ugly than you and your syphilitic uglies.”

Flynn cackles, his stomach receding as the bottle rests on his lips… He pulls it away in a sobering thought.

“Then, again, if I was married to a loser who couldn’t take out Benjamin Crane, I’d probably have a little difficulty maintaining interest in the bedroom myself.”

Flynn shrugs then takes a swig of the drink down the hatch. The swill is sour on his lips, but his squinted eyes only make him more determined to force the slop down his throat.

"Mystery. Whatever the Hell you are biologically. I don't care what’s under the mask, Feder’s face or otherwise. Get blood testing, DNA Testing, get Sid Feder's birth certificate straight from the hands of the doctor that had to pull that abominable excuse of a functioning multicellular organism out of Mama Feder's gaping manhole cover."

"I still watch you speak."

"And the only thing I can think...Is how sad it is that after Lethal Lottery, both of those finalists died. And then forgot to stay dead."

The arm falls by Flynn’s side. His neck turns as if trying to lift, but no stretch returns the bottle to Flynn’s lips. It dangles still… As Flynn’s lips continue to move…

"You and Cyren. Interchangeable back stories. Interchangeable skills in the ring."

“And recent interchangeable mutilations of your previously legendary legacies.”

Flynn leans back in his chair, his grip allowing the bottle to spill onto his leg. The drink runs straight down his shin and starts to yellow his socks… Flynn doesn’t seem to notice.

“Cyren, in case you’ve been having difficulty keeping track of him Mystery, has been literally sprinting downhill since his match against Tristan Slater.”

“First round loss in the United States Title Tournament against Tommy Carlos King.”

Flynn blinks.

“And no, I don’t know who that is, either.”

“Followed by an embarrassing firing from Warfare.”

“And leave it to Shane to keep trying to recycle the same old garbage. To keep wheeling corpses out to the center of the ring like they’ll suddenly rise from the dead and start shucking and jiving to his tune.”

“Michael James. Dead. First in, First out of our Elimination Tag Meeting.”

“What.”

“A.”

“Return.”

“Cyren? After losing that huge tag match in five minutes against Donathan where he swore that ‘THIS ONE WAS GOING TO BE A BARN BURNER!’”

“After losing to that alien with the glass jaw who should’ve taken some focus off of Wilkins and put it on the knee I sent hurtling towards his face.”

Flynn slaps his own leg with a smile. The alcohol splatters in his hand. He looks down and tilts the bottle back up to his lips, taking another gulp.

He lets the remainder of his drink… spill into this hair. He shakes it above his head, the yellow running down his back. He inhales… his eyes close… his shoulders tense a moment and then return to the back of the chair…

As his hidden hand still visibly fiddles with something…

“After these embarrassing losses. After the never-ending funeral of an XWF legend was thought to have reached its lowest point…”

“Shane , in a desperate attempt to get him back on some semblance of image recovery, put him against three nobodies to at least try to get him a building winning streak.”

“And he loses against the first one in line.”

“XWF Legend Cyren loses against John Black.”

“Of course, Cyren, being determined to find the bottom of this sinking ship so he can drill more holes into it, had taken it upon himself to manage the trio of Ann Thraxx, JP Corino and CM Punk.”

“Which imploded when the three of them started turning on each other before their first match happened.”

Flynn spins the bottle in his hand, shaking his head…

“Everything Cyren touches turns to shit.”

“And the only differene in my eyes between you and him, Mystery?”

Flynn’s eyes turn from his bottle to his bare wrist. He rotates his neck as he raises his hand, his loose torn sleeve drooping now around his elbow…

“I’d say three weeks.”

“Three, maybe four weeks, before you get solved. Like a complex math problem. Difficult at the moment. Child’s play in retrospect.”

Flynn starts wrenching his hand out of the pocket… A glint of light can be seen as fingers creep…

Then, they slide back in.

“You see, Mystery. For men like you. It’s all about presentation.”

“Not even the best presentation.”

“Just that jump scare at the end.”

“You meander around, screaming about saws and dismemberment like a nine year old who thinks chain saws and dismemberments are the most cool teenage things EVER!”

“And all you need to get people paying attention is that air of the unknown.”

“That split-second of insecurity in a lack of knowledge.”

“It’s like a drug. Intoxication. It must feel great having these gaping chimps ooh and ahh at your ridiculous excuses for promos.”

“And just like a drug. You’ve become dependent.”

“No matter what direction you take, you just keep sliding in twist endings.”

“I’m Sid Feder. I’m not Sid Feder. I’ve been with Donathan. I’m betraying Donathan. I’m not Sid Feder. I am Sid Feder. No, really, I’m Sid Feder, this time. Wait, now, you’re Sid Feder. You’ve been Sid Feder. That’s why you’re confused and that’s why neither of us know what I’m slash you’re talking about. You start making sense, I’ll start making sense, Flo will start making dinner, Flo died, Donathan will start making dinner.”

“And it’s hard to not see the problem here, Mystery.”

“You’re running out of twists. And your actual promos aren’t good enough to stand on your own without them.”

“The meat of your last promo last week? The one where you tried to take me down?”

“You mixed up my name with Luca Arzewhocares.”

“…”

“I’m going to repeat that.”

“Mister Mystery. The man you’re all raising up as the undefeatable juggernaut of the XWF.”

“When faced with the difficult Gordian’s Knot of trash talking the most hated man in the XWF, a bearded dwarf, a midget in tattered clothes, the thief, the clown, the constantly delusional idiot that I am.”

“You decide to mix up my name with someone else on my team.”

“You know. The way a stupid celebrity magazine mixes together the names of two celebrities currently rubbing together their disgusting genitals in a desperate attempt to stay relevant by creating hideously mindless children whose every whim is satisfied by their third world sweatshop counterparts.”

“Our resident ‘Serial Killer’ is apparently borrowing trash talk techniques from Glamour.”

“First off, the amalgam of my two opponents this Sunday is Sebaceous Cystery.”

“Which is not only an combination ten times better than your two abortions, but also exquisitely captures how both you and Sebastian Duke are lumbering sacks of jiggling fat, expanding with momentary victories, ripe for popping.”

“Second…Is... Was that really good enough for you? Does that uphold to your high quality standards?”

“Is that really the promo in which you want to claim that I can’t craft a competent story? Do you have a drafting process? Had it been a hard week?”

“Is it getting harder for you to pump out this semi-passable garbage at your current rate?”

“Burning out at the edges there, kiddo? Watching your last bit of tripe, that’s the vibe I’m getting.”

“I get it. You’re a murderer and a crazy person. You talk about dismemberments like a shock comedian. The rookies are supposed to go ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ and because they’re still in short pants and can’t wrestle more than a few weeks without shitting the bed, they do it. But I don’t feel it, Mystery.”

“I felt your enraged fist pound into my face, a wondrously expanding pool of blood around us two in synchronous victim-victim relationship, until I literally couldn’t feel it anymore.”

“And even I’m having difficulty buying that you’re a psychopath.”

“You don’t…” Flynn waves his bottled hand in a circle in front of him, cycling to find the perfect word… “SAVOR the idea of violence. You don’t WORSHIP the blood flowing out of a maimed dolt’s skull who dared think he could defeat you. You don’t LUST after carnage and wreckage.”

His hidden hand gets a hold of the object and Flynn’s eyes bug out.

“You just… sort of do it.”

Flynn’s harsh angry tones seem to soften. His voice becomes quiet and calm. Flynn’s arm extends beyond the realms of his suit pocket, that light shining in the form…

“It happens… around you.”

Of a metal Zippo lighter.

His hand still drenched in alcohol…

He opens the Zippo… Mesmerized…

“There’s no…”

Presses his thumb down on the spark wheel.

“…”

“Spontaneity.”

Flynn clicks his tongue. His finger moves up and closes the Zippo.

“Mystery. I’d like to extend to you congratulations. That was one Hell of a performance you put on Saturday.”

Flynn grins… still staring at the lighter.

“You pinned two men that had already been pre-assaulted after I kicked your ass from one corner of the ring to the other.”

“Very impressive.”

Flynn stares into the lighter. His thumb flicks it back open…

“But this gauntlet…”

His thumb returns to the spark wheel….His nail digs to turn…

“Anything goes.”

“And the way we’ve danced in the past?”

“If I’m honest.”

Flynn slowly slides the wheel, the mechanism turning soothing him. The stone creates no sparks…

“I don’t want a one-on-one fight.”

“I don’t want to meet you first.”

“I want to meet you after you blow through three or four of these rejects.”

“After one of them gets a lucky shot on your guts. On your spleen. On your rib cage.”

“Like fine chefs. Tenderizing my meal. Softening it… Ensuring my unending pleasure in every morsel… Fit for a King.”

“Because beating you fairly? I’ll leave that to the Ben Cranes of this federation.”

“All I want… All I really want.”

Flynn stops spinning it.

“When I step up those steps, I want to see the hate in your eyes. I want to see you physically ill, laid out in the center of the ring. Trying to muster yourself off the mat through sheer force of loathing.”

“And when you get up, I’ll knee your skull concave.”

“And when I steal another 3-count.”

“While I snuff out another conquering champion on the route to victory unfairly.”

“I hope the cameras are rolling. I hope I remember to set my DVR to record.”

“Because the only thing I want more than being the King of XWF.”

“Is to have an eternal copy, a seventeen second recording, of your semi-conscious face.”

“When you fail.”

“Against Mark.”

“Fucking.”

“Flynn.”

Flynn's fingers tighten around the Zippo.

He slowly presses the lighter into his whiskey drenched scalp...

“Show’s over, kids.”

The lighter clicks…